Tea Bagged Bender
Surly Brewing Co.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pours a half finger of beige head. Color is a brown caramel mahogany.

Aroma: Super hoppy. Insane amount here. Awesome. Grapefruit and citrus with some orange. A little caramel and chocolate flavors.

Taste: Orange and grapefruit citrus. Very hoppy. Some floral notes. A bit of coffee roast and some chocolate.

Mouthfeel: Bitter, but creamy and smooth. Lower amount of carbonation but it works with this beer. A little thin on the body.

Overall, this is a completely different beer from bender. It crushes regular bender. This is amazing. So hoppy, yet the malts provide complementary flavors.

On tap at the Happy Gnome and more recently at Winterfest.

Deep brown, almost black in the glass. Large tannish head floats nicely at the top of the glass.

Definitely a different aroma to this versus original Bender. Smells sticky with hops...citrus scents, grapefruit.

Tastes malty, but goes down very easily and finishes nicely on the palate with a kick of those Amarillo hops. Like others have said, there is a slight hint of chocolate as well.

Lightly bubbly, very smooth...I had a few of these. Yum.

This beer looked black at a glance, but held to the light, it was a glowing foggy purple. The head was a tall billowy light tan that fell after a while to a film that left some nice lace.

Smells of sour mandarin oranges and pineapple with a slight dry milk chocolate.

Tasted of a light, washed out coffee and cherry that is pounced upon by a dry airy pine and grapefruit that fades to a sweet coffee and cream towards the back of my tongue. There’s also a persistent undertone of light milk chocolate from beginning to end.

The mouth feel is light to medium bodied and glassy smooth with an almost invisible, but notable tingly carbonation.

Magnificent. Having taken a few sips of this at the Happy Gnome’s Surly Cask gathering, I asked Surly’s Omar about the odd hop content of this batch of bender. He said that it was probably due to the pound of Amarillo he tossed into the firkin. That would do it. This one’s stellar. Keep on making great beer!